


Avenger | Dantes -- Hell is the Château d’If

by HolyGrailWarGM (RavenkinLegacy)



Series: Dreams of a Grand Order [3]
Category: Fate/Grand Order
Genre: Misattribution of Arousal, Other, Temporary Character Death, Threats of Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-11
Updated: 2018-09-11
Packaged: 2019-07-10 22:56:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15959327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RavenkinLegacy/pseuds/HolyGrailWarGM
Summary: The King of the Cavern has no time for a weak Master.





	Avenger | Dantes -- Hell is the Château d’If

Flucticulus Diana blazes.  Even through the arm that I bring up to shield my eyes, I can still see a silhouette of Avenger’s cloak as he flies headfirst into the fray.

The ringing of Caligula’s Noble Phantasm dulls my brain, but I still manage to think:   _This is it.  We’re done here.  Four levels behind us, four enemies down, and we’re dead on the fifth stage.  There’s no way Avenger can get his Noble Phantasm past that--_

But through the horrible ringing…  there is laughter. Cruel, unhinged, mocking laughter.

“ _Enfer… Château d’If_!”

My eyes fly open in surprise.  For Avenger to push past the devouring moonlight…

I watch as Avenger’s cloak erupts into a writhing mass of shadows, its tendrils seeping across the floor and crawling up the walls and dripping down from the ceiling as the tower bends to its Master’s bidding.  The all-consuming darkness swallows the artificial moonlight, leaving the Embodiment of Gluttony wrapped tightly in the grasping shadows.

Avenger’s many mirrored copies surround the enemy and raise their hands.  The final blast of hateful magic shines through the shadows almost as an afterthought, an ostentatious display of overkill, just to ensure that the opponent is well and truly defeated.

Then it’s over.

The shadows recede just enough for me to make out Caligula’s form, slumped on his knees in the center of the chamber.  A dimness hangs about him. Everything from his violet hair to his ornate armor seems tarnished, like the shadows of the Château are still clinging to him.

Even when I defeated him in Septem, he hadn’t looked quite so forlorn.

He sways, a hand reaching out toward me.  Already, I can see the golden light beginning to rise up from his body as it prepares to dissolve away.

“Di-a-na…”

His voice is barely more than a strained whisper, but the word rings clearly to my ears, to my mind, and steals the breath from my lungs.  The Mad Emperor has only ever called me that once. Hearing it now, in this dark place, brings back the memory of a calmer dream, of madness lifted on a hillside beneath the light of the moon, a conversation with a Servant who looked at me with the same reverence that he gave to his goddess.

The tender look in his eyes brings back images of the light of Chaldea.  I take in a shuddering breath and let my own hand reach up toward him, as though the distance that separates us is nothing, as though my will and his sudden calm together can bring me out of this hell.

_crunch_

Caligula’s head twists at an unnatural angle.  His eyes go glassy. I can do nothing but stare in shock as his form dissolves into golden dust with a sound of rushing sand and glass chips.

Avenger stands behind the pile of dust that Caligula became.  His gloved hand is outstretched and clenched into a fist.

My focus on the defeated Servant distracted me from the victorious one. My fuzzy brain takes too long to put together what happened:  the stance, the outstretched hand curled into a fist, the pile of Servant-dust.

Avenger had the enemy at his mercy, and he has shown none.  No, more than that: he has used his power in the worst way.

Avenger’s hand drops to his side beneath the crackling cloak.  His white hair flies around his head as wildly as the sparks from his cloak.  The fire of the hellish Château still burns brightly in his eyes. His manic sneer, combined with that fire, turns his face into something from a nightmare.

In all the battles that I’ve been through with him so far, I’ve never seen him quite like this.

_I’m going to die here.  And he might very well be the one to kill me._

My legs won’t work.  I want to move, I need to _run_ , but my legs won’t work at all.  I’m rooted to the spot as my temporary Servant breaks his own stillness and advances.  He barely even walks, just glides across the stone, slow and steady like a tiger sure of catching his prey.

There he is, all deadly grace; here I am, and I cannot move, cannot breath, cannot think, besides:

_I’m going to die._

The room begins to spin.

_Move.  Run. Go._

But my useless legs have other ideas.  Instead of carrying me to safety -- _where in this hell would be safe, anyway?_ \-- they collapse like sacks of wet sand.  My knees hit the floor hard and my hands hit even harder as I try to break my fall.  The sting travels up my arms, quickly replaced by the frigid chill of the stone.

And still the room spins.  The chamber is collapsing, the floor dropping out beneath my stomach and the ceiling falling in on my head.  A cloud of obscuring fog presses in and blocks off my thoughts. I lean forward, try to focus on the chill in my hands, to give myself some grounding, but the floor won’t stop shaking.

No, not the floor.  Me.

_No no no no no no no_

Not an attack.  Not here. Not in this hell.  Not now, with Avenger’s fiery eyes burning into me.  Not after the terrible thing I just saw, that could just as easily happen to me.

_I’m going to die_

The fog closes in, and my breath comes in short, shallow gasps around the solid lump of frozen fear that has settled just above my quivering stomach.  I squeeze my eyes tightly shut. If I can just remember to breathe, if I can just control my heart…

“Get up.”

The proximity of Avenger’s voice sends a jolt of fear through me, but it is the kind of fear that demands attention, action, not passive hiding.  My eyes fly open to see his boots, close enough to touch. (Scuffed leather, with a studded strap across the top, fastened by a silver buckle.) The lump of fear threatens to rise into my throat and I wrestle it down as I force my gaze to travel upwards (the black trousers, the silver buttons of that swirling black cloak, the gold medallion) to his face.

The sneer is gone, and so too is the terrible fire, replaced by a terrible boredom.  His expression is completely dispassionate, his mouth set into an apathetic line. He doesn’t even look annoyed at my failure to follow his order.  He must see the fear in my face -- I can’t cover it up while I’m fighting this panic -- but the only thing he does is command me again, “Get up.”

I wish for nothing more.  I’ve been doing so well, keeping the specter of my fear at bay these past four days.  It’s been there, of course, lurking under the surface. It always is. But I can pretend.  I can put on a good face. I joke, and exaggerate, and dramatize. It always makes Mash laugh and sigh, and it makes me feel like I actually know what I’m doing.

Except now I’m here, and the illusion is falling apart.

I close my eyes against Avenger’s scrutinous gaze and bow my head again.  There’s no way I can focus enough to form words, but if I can’t get words out, I can try again to stand.  I tense my legs, willing them to move, but they don’t budge. Precious air escapes my lungs in a shaky huff.

Avenger’s boots circle me with a steady _click… click… click…_ as he paces around me.  His slow prowl reinforces the impression of a tiger on the hunt.  That mental image does nothing to calm my nerves.

He makes a circle and a half, and his footsteps stop just behind me.  “You have defeated five enemies so far in this hell,” Avenger drones, “Are you not pleased with your progress?”

The image of Caligula’s last moment flashes behind my eyelids.

 _Di-a-na_ , he had pleaded.   _crunch_

“Answer me, my temporary Master.”  The deep baritone of Avenger’s command sinks deep into my mind.  “Are you not satisfied with the results of our contract?”

The room continues to spin.  Gluttony’s last gaze is burned into my brain.  The light of his form disappearing still shines, and behind him, the incredible darkness that is Avenger.

 _How can I be satisfied when I’m terrified,_ I can’t say.  The words come to my mind like they’re wading through molasses.  I try to get them from my mind to my mouth, but the lump of fear has spread from my chest up to my throat, blocking my voice.

With an incomplete contract, I cannot be sure that he hears the thoughts in my mind.  Part of me hopes that he doesn’t.

 _You killed him,_ I can’t say.  The image floods into my mind, sending another wave of shaking down my arms.   _He was already down and you killed him._

Behind me, Avenger waits silently.  Not patiently, I would guess, but I have no way to know.  He has been impossible to read for our entire acquaintance, distant and cold and untouchable.  Dispassionate in everything. Showing emotion only to mock and to murder.

_You killed him, like you’ve killed them all._

The thing I’ve been trying not to think comes into my brain:

_Would you do it to me, if you could?_

That gives me a spark of confidence, or at least of desperation.  If I die, it will be on my feet.

I force strength into my legs and feel them tense, feel my knees push against the cold of the stone.  I lift my head up, preparing to stand…

And am stopped short by the sliding sensation of Avenger’s gloved fingers working into my hair.

Everything stops.

A realization hits me like a ton of bricks:  I’m a Master, but I am not _his_ Master.  I have no power over him.  Fear floods through my whole body, spreads the lump from my chest and throat down to the pit of my stomach, where it sets me trembling uncontrollably.

In moments of fear and panic like this, our minds set themselves on the strangest of things:

_How dare his hand be so warm_

Strong fingers card through my hair, working down to the scalp and twisting until his grip is inescapable.  The heel of his palm rests against the base of my skull, warm and solid. He isn’t poised to yank, but to control.

This of course should come as no comfort.  But my panic has gone as far as it can. I’ve passed the point of escalation and entered the realm of acceptance.

My mind drifts to my Command Seals.  Would they work? Could I stop him? But I know the truth:

_He could kill me right now.  All it takes is a twist. There’s nothing I can do to stop him._

Then his hand is moving, pulling my head back, forcing me to look him in the face.

His mouth is still set into a line.  The fire of the Château has left his eyes burning low as embers.  His cloak is no longer crackling, but still it swirls around us -- around me -- engulfing me in its terrible darkness.  He tightens his grip even further, and I flinch. I’ve tried so hard not to flinch around him. That more than anything is what brings my bravado back.

“Is this it, then?” I ask with a grin to hide my terror.  “You’re tired of waiting for these Lords to kill me, and you’ve decided to do it yourself?  Just--” my damned voice betrays me with a shudder “--just a twist, and be done with it?”

The King of the Cavern says nothing, only studies my face with an expression cold enough to burn.  The chill from the floor seeps through my clothes and sinks into my knees. My hands can no longer reach the floor, instead dangling uselessly by my sides as I meet my captor’s gaze with all the defiance that my panic will allow me to muster.

“Is that what has you affected, my Master?”

By his tone, I would expect him to be idly swirling a glass of wine as he listens to a casual acquaintance yammer on about something inane, not standing over me on my knees with his hand in a death grip in my hair.

“I-- wh-- what?!” I sputter and clench my fists.  “You--” He tugs again, a subtle twist of his wrist sending a jolt of pain through my scalp.  I grunt and gasp. “Yes! Yes, it _affected_ me!”

“Why.”

The bored tone, the apathetic gaze, do more to bring out my own emotion than the rest of this hell ever could.  “Caligula-- He was down! He was already dying! You’d already killed him, and you just had to -- what? -- make sure?”

I huff out another shuddering breath and allow my eyes to fall shut.  Now that I’ve started, what’s the harm in finishing the thought? I just don’t want to look at him when I say it.

“You had him at your mercy.  Like you… Like you have me, at your mercy.”

And just like that, the tension that I’m holding flees from my body.  My shoulders sag and my arms go limp. My hands uncurl and dangle again at my sides.

That, I think, is the last thing that my brain can put into words.  There’s more there, in the darkness of that chamber and the shadow of this Servant, but the feeling isn’t something I can identify.  Besides, the important part is out there now: he is stronger than I could ever be, and I know that he’s willing to use it. I can do nothing to stop him.  He’s just… there.

Behind me, his weight shifts.  I hear the creak of his boots, the rustling of his cloak.  The pull on my hair grows tighter and a strange warmth takes residence at my back.  I take a chance and open my eyes to meet his frightening fiery gaze. I’m shocked to find his face directly above mine; he is kneeling behind me now.

Even like this, Avenger towers over me.

I only have a moment to reorient myself before he uses the grip in my hair to pull me backward.  I try to resist it for a moment before just letting it go, following his lead although the motion brings pain to my folded legs.  I land hard against his chest.

At this angle, I can’t see his eyes any longer and am forced to gaze into the empty, dim room.

Avenger’s free hand finds purchase on my wrist, as though to control the hand where my Command Spells rest.  I move on instinct to reach for him, to stop him, but another twist in my hair draws a whimper from my lips and prompts me to lower my hand, bringing it to rest on the cloak that swirls around us.  I can feel the tendrils of darkness creep up my wrist and wrap around my ankles, not tight enough to restrict, but solid enough for the suggestion of restraint.

It’s not a comforting embrace, but like the warmth of the hand in my hair, the certainty of the hold lends itself to acceptance of the situation.

When he is satisfied that I won’t fight against him, he slowly releases my hair.  The gloved hand slides from the base of my skull down the back of my neck. Slowly, gently, that hand wraps and closes around my throat.

I swallow hard against his grip, just to test it.  It gives easily. Like the grip in my hair had been, this is not meant to hurt but to control.  I can breathe, I can probably speak, but the message is clear: I am more at his mercy now than ever before.

In the darkness and the stillness, with only the sound of my breath and the movement of his cloak, something changes.  Kneeling there on the cold stone with the warmth of this cold-hearted Servant at my back, the bone-deep terror settles in and gives way to an unnameable feeling.  All I know is the certainty: Avenger has all the power here, and I am completely in his hands.

He holds me there for a long time, just allowing me to rest against his chest and to breathe past the hand at my throat.

When finally he speaks, it is a low hiss that falls between menace and praise.  “Ah, my temporary Master. Foolish and proud, but not stupid. You’ve finally figured it out.”

I say nothing.  I only breathe and wait.

“If I wanted to kill you,” he goes on, “I would have.  I could have, so many times. It’s obvious to you now, with your fluttering pulse and your useless Command Spells trapped beneath my hands.  But the danger is always there.”

His cruelly matter-of-fact words skip straight past my brain and skitter down my spine, leaving a trembling sensation in their wake.

“You are afraid.”

I keep my silence until he abruptly squeezes my wrist.  “Ah… yes. Yes, I’m afraid.” My voice comes out in a shaky whisper, but with the confession comes so much relief that I can’t find it in myself to be embarrassed.

“You’ve been through so much of this hell already,” he murmurs.  “What a shame it would be if you were to give up now.” His breath stirs my hair, sending a thrill of heat down my spine again.

I breathe deeply, letting the chill of the stone floor settle my nerves.  Avenger waits patiently for once while I collect myself. When my voice finally comes out, it’s barely more than a whisper:  “I’m not giving up.”

“Are you certain?”  he presses. “If you wish to end this Hell, only tell me.  I would be happy to assist.”

He doesn’t sound happy.  Not like Sanson sounded when he made me the same solemn offer, like it was his duty and his pleasure.  No, Avenger’s voice is tinged with regret.

I take a breath, another, a third.  I know he wants me to answer, although I don’t know what answer he expects.  So I repeat:

“I’m not giving up.  Besides, wouldn’t killing me here be a mercy?  I know you don’t have any of that.”

He chuckles darkly, a shadow of his maniacal laughter.  The hand that grasps my wrist releases its hold and travels up my arm to settle in my hair again.  With pressure under my chin and a controlling tug to my scalp, he forces my head to tilt back and rest on his shoulder.  His mouth is barely a breath from mine.

“If death is what you want, I would give it to you eagerly, in whatever manner you wish.”

The tone of threat and promise is like molten stone pooling in my stomach.  I can’t close my eyes, I can’t stand to look at him, but I can’t look away. All it would take is a little leaning forward… but he has me rooted in place.  At his whims.

So instead, I say a third time:  “I’m not giving up. I’ll see this through to the end.”

His mouth widens into a grin.  He starts to reply, when a quiet cough sounds from the doorway of the chamber.  Avenger stills and looks up to face the intruder.

“Ah,” he murmurs, “Mercedes.  You’ve come to check in on us.”

The strange woman’s voice barely reaches my ears through the pulse pounding in them.  “Yes, I wished to verify your safety. You’ve defeated the avatar of Gluttony.”

“We have.”

“Is the Master alright?”

Avenger’s golden gaze slides down to meet mine, and he slowly releases the grasp on my hair.  His hand follows the path that the shiver had taken down my back, coming to rest on my hip.

“Yes,” he tells her, “the Master is fine.”

Without the grip on my head, I can lower it enough to get eyes on the woman in the doorway.  The ghost of a frown is etched into her features and makes an unconvinced noise, but nods all the same.  “Very well. Please don’t be long. I’m sure that the Master needs rest.”

As she turns and steps out of the room, Avenger’s hand drops from my throat.  The tendrils around my wrists and ankles recede as he stands. My legs feel cold -- the floor and the position have done me no favors.  Relief floods into me when Avenger circles around to stand before me and offers me his hand. I take it and pull myself upright, but my useless legs have other ideas.  I stumble…

And suddenly my feet are off the ground, and I’m being pressed to Avenger’s chest.  He has one arm under my knees and the other around my back.

“Uh?” is all that comes to mind.

When he turns his gaze to me, it is neither blazing nor cold.  Something else hovers in that gaze, something that echoes my unnameable feeling.

“I remain your Servant, your guide in this wretched place,” he tells me as he begins to walk, “and I will carry your weak body if I must.”

For a long moment, the only sound is the click of his boot heels on the tower floor.  Then we’ve reached the door, the strange directionless hallway that will take us back to the chambers that the tower has prepared for me.  As we step into that hall and the battle chamber vanishes behind us, I hear him murmur lowly, “So long as the strength of your spirit remains.”

He deposits me outside my room and waits until I’ve gotten inside safely before vanishing into the shadows of the tower.  I stand on legs still shaking, and eventually make my way over to the bed.

And if I spend the rest of my waking moments that night mulling over the feeling of his hand on my throat, the tug on my hair, the lips just a breath from my own, and the ache in my knees as I kneel at his mercy…

Well, if I think about that long into the night, that’s my own business.

**Author's Note:**

> Gosh, I'm self-conscious about this one!
> 
> This was the first dream that I thought of, way back when the Tower event was going on. It took me at least four rewrites before I could stop fussing at it and actually just post it. If the narrative switches tenses 18 times, that’s why. (Please point that out if you see it, here and in anything else I post.)
> 
> One of my favorite things about the Fate series is the dynamics that can come out between the Masters and the Servants: one is nominally in charge, but the other has so much more strength, and how do you balance that? The answer is usually with respect, frequently with snark, and occasionally with the bitter realization that a Master with a murderous Servant just has to keep up their guard.


End file.
